Look, it's not you, it's me. No no, it's true. You haven't changed in years and I guess that's the problem. I have loved you since I heard you all those years ago. I have five pieces of your artwork. I carry at least one of them everywhere I go, every single day of our lives. But I don't know how much longer I can do it.

What's wrong? In a word, you're boring. You have been for years, and I've tried my best to overlook it.

Oh sure, an AMOLED screen here, a new case color there, but you have done nothing innovative, nothing cutting-edge, since the initial batch of design brilliance that made me fall in love with you in the first place.

Why am I bringing this up now? The X7. Same same, same same. HEY don't get mad at me, it's true. Be mad at yourself. Why you even bothered kind-of highlighted just how much we've grown apart, I guess.

No, honey, no... don't try that with me. No you haven't been concentrating on audio and video quality. I'm sorry babe, but I know. I've listened to my FLACs. I've encoded hundreds of video clips. It's bad enough when the specs of your last 6 or so players seem identical; from quality to codec support to the intentionally corrupted files that will lock your units up.

But? Yes. But - when my ears cannot tell a difference large enough that I can't be sure it's just not me hoping, wanting something to be different. Yes. YES! Look, there's no denying it. You're not trying. I don't know why. Maybe you're lazy. Maybe the only intelligent design engineer left you and you can't replace him/her. Maybe it's greed and low costs. I don't know. YOU DO. For all I know it's something as simple as your first design engineer over-estimated the quantity of those Wolfson DACs by hundreds of thousands, so you put them in every unit until you run out?

All these touch-screens and you never once took advantage of it. I mean, a handwriting transcription app? Since you've never bothered to license a Java machine to give us at least the apps of a '00 cell phone, but this Flash Lite that, let's face it, no one uses. Thanks, babe.

Your lack of drive is what frustrates me the most. You know, you could spend a few hours on re-designing the analog output, I mean those Wolfson's can let you sing out some nice Class-A DAC sweetness, but you keep feeding me the direct output from what's probably the circuitry implementation from Wolfson's own reference design in the damn datasheet! With a couple select components and choice layout, you could improve the SNR, lower the noise floor, increase the usable power... be *the* top player in SQ again!

Or if you're in a software mood, maybe finally add chapters and multi-bookmarking for audiobook tracks, compilation tagging, return to previous shuffle states, save states for each file so you can change video tracks without having to seek, and on and on and on. No, no. Don't pretend I've never mentioned these things before. Playing innocent won't work.

You have the power, the ability. And it's not even cutting edge thinking, at this point it's just keeping up! And you can't bother to do even that. You do your makeup and hair, and yes I love the way you recreate your body and sometimes your UI, but I know you, I know it's the same you underneath, and I would love you if you no matter how your rectangular body looks, but that's not the point.

I'm sorry, Angel. I love you. I'll always love you. But you have given up and I don't know if I can continue our relationship. You're beginning to... well... as I said, bore me.

Look, I'm sorry, I got to go... Remember what I said, yes? And take care of yourself.